The “legal blackmail” business: inside a P2P settlement factory

UK pornographer Jasper Feversham was fed up. The Internets were sharing his films, quality work like Catch Her in the Eye, Skin City, and MILF Magic 3. He wanted revenge—or at least a cut. So Feversham signed on to a relatively new scheme: track down BitTorrent infringers, convert their IP addresses into real names, and blast out warning letters threatening litigation if they didn't cough up a few hundred quid.

"Much looking forward to sending letters to these f—ers," he wrote in an email earlier this year.

The law firm he ended up with was ACS Law, run by middle-aged lawyer Andrew Crossley. ACS Law had, after a process of attrition, become one of the only UK firms to engage in such work. Unfortunately for Crossley, mainstream film studios had decided that suing file-sharers brought little apart from negative publicity, and so Crossley was left defending a heap of pornography, some video games, and a few musical tracks.

Crossley parleyed the porn into national celebrity—or perhaps "infamy" would be a better word. Earlier this year, Crossley was excoriated in the House of Lords by Lord Lucas of Crudwell and Dingwall—yes, I know—for what "amounts to blackmail... The cost of defending one of these things is reckoned to be £10,000. You can get away with asking for £500 or £1,000 and be paid on most occasions without any effort having to be made to really establish guilt. It is straightforward legal blackmail."

Lord Lucas went on to offer an amendment to the (now-passed) Digital Economy Bill, titled "Remedy for groundless threats of copyright infringement proceedings."

But the Lords were just getting started. Lord Young of Norwood Green likened firms such as ACS Law to "rogue wheel-clampers, if I can use that analogy," while the Earl of Erroll railed against the way that "ACS Law and others threaten people with huge costs in court unless they roll over and give lots of money up front, so that people end up settling out of court. The problem is the cost of justice, which is a huge block. We have to remember that."

Lord Clement-Jones also called out Crossley's work. "Like many noble Lords, I have had an enormous postbag about the activities of this law firm. It is easy to say 'of certain law firms,' but this is the only one that I have been written to about... ACS seems to specialize in picking up bogus copyright claims and then harassing innocent householders and demanding £500, £650, or whatever—a round sum, in any event—in order to settle."

May go for a Lambo or Ferrari. I am so predictable!

That was only the start of Crossley's problems. In the last 12 months, Crossley has been targeted by the Blackpool municipal government, dogged by journalists, hounded by a major consumer group, and hauled up before the Solicitors Regulation Authority for disciplinary proceedings. Baffled, angry people write his office daily, denying any knowledge of his charges. He has blacklisted his own ex-wife in his e-mail client, demanding that she cut off all contact with him forever. Clients press him to pay up. His own data suppliers are, he fears, out to screw him, and Crossley harbors the suspicion that he could make far more money in America, where fat statutory damage awards mean he could demand even more cash from his targets.

And, just to put a ridiculous cherry atop his plate of problems, the streets department in Westminster, London—where Crossley keeps his office—went after ACS Law because some of their office waste mysteriously "ended up in the public highway."

"We are a tightly resourced small firm," Crossley complained as he wheedled the fine in half.

But not that tightly resourced. Crossley bragged over e-mail earlier this year that he "spent much of the weekend looking for a new car. Finances are much better so can put £20-30k down. May go for a Lambo or Ferrari. I am so predictable!" He began looking at new homes, including a gated property with "five double bedrooms, three bathrooms, modern kitchen and four reception rooms."

Keeping track of all the details might not be Crossley's strong suit. As he wrote (one assumes in jest) when a dispute about financial issues came up, "I am not an accountant, true. But I am a genius and everything I do is brilliant. You must understand that!"

He's also dogged. With all the hate, a lesser man might have buckled—as did other law firms like Tilly Bailey & Irvine, which dropped its own "settlement letter" business in April 2010 after "adverse publicity." Instead, Crossley plows ahead, defending work like To the Manner Porn and Weapons of Mass Satisfaction; indeed, he seems rather philosophical about his lot in life.

"Sorry to bombard you with more things to deal with," he wrote recently to a colleague, "but this business seems to have its share of complications." Indeed it does—and the complications get even more complicated when you anger the anonymous masses at 4chan, who promptly crash your website, expose your private e-mail, and in doing so shed a powerful and unflattering light on the real practice of P2P lawyering. Drawing on thousands of personal e-mails, Ars takes you inside the world of ACS Law, reveal its connections to the US Copyright Group, and discovers just what Andrew Crossley thinks of Godfather 3.

Spoiler: "Godfather 3 is not quite as bad as I remember."

Operation Payback

"This will be a calm, coordinated display of blood," said the initial call to action. "We will not be merciful. We will not be newfags."

Users of the free-wheeling (to put it mildly) Internet community 4chan last week implemented "Operation Payback," a distributed denial of service attack against various anti-piracy groups the 4channers didn't like. The RIAA was hit. The MPAA was hit. But after some big targets, Operation Payback moved on to smaller firms, including ACS Law.

I have far more concern over the fact of my train turning up 10 minutes late or having to queue for a coffee than them wasting my time with this sort of rubbish.

After the group's data flood knocked the ACS Law website offline for a few hours, UK tech site The Register called up Andrew Crossley to ask him about the attack. The site was "only down for a few hours," Crossley said. "I have far more concern over the fact of my train turning up 10 minutes late or having to queue for a coffee than them wasting my time with this sort of rubbish."

He has something to be concerned about now. After these comments, Operation Payback hit ACS Law a second time, knocking out the site. In the process of bringing it back up, someone exposed the server's directory structure through the Web instead of showing the website itself. Those conducting Operation Payback immediately moved in and grabbed a 350MB archive of ACS Law e-mails, then threw the entire mass up on sites like The Pirate Bay.

This is more than a matter of mere embarrassment. The UK has tougher data protection laws than the US, and the country's Information Commissioner has already made it clear that ACS Law could be on the hook for hundreds of thousands of pounds. That's because, in addition to his iTunes receipts ("Hooray for iPads. I love mine," Crossley says at one point) and Amazon purchase orders, the e-mails include numerous attachments filled with all manner of private information: names, addresses, payment details, passwords, revenue splits, business deals.

All of which is horrible, terrible, awful news—unless you want to know how a firm like ACS Law actually works.

90 Reader Comments

Piracy is a problem, but let's face it...it's like trying to plug the hole with your finger while the entire dam is coming down around you. They're not going to be able to scare people with litigation or even jail time. It's clearly not working. The times are changing for both the film industry and music industry. They're not going to be able to litigate their way back to profits. They have to rethink their business.

Also, anyone else notice that it's mainly the fat-cat middle-men in these industries that make the biggest stink about it? You know, the ones that make the most yet do the least....all riding on the backs of the artists for decades, yet hypocritically shouting how piracy hurts the artists?

i am 63 yrs old, chronicaly disabled, dependant on oxygen 24/7, and i recently recieved a letter from acs-law demanding a settlement of £1200 for a porn download which i have no knowledge of. I was shocked when i first recieved it, then that turned to anger. After doing a bit of research i realised i was not alone.There is plenty of stuff out there to look at and seek advice from. So do not pay this company any money untill you have covered all options.

I can't believe the courts here in the US still allow p2p cases to be tried as copyright infringement. The fines associated are exorbitant and truly do not reflect the loss that the company suffered from the download. It makes me sick

That's a damn good story Nate - well written, well researched, pacey and detailed. True, the thread half writes itself, but it's good to see someone putting some effort in to go deeper.

On the issue, IP is a problem. I defend IP, as someone who writes code and other gibberish, I want to be paid for my creative efforts - but defending digital IP with these kind of tactics is doomed to failure. Rather then surrendering to the freetards - which in the long run is a losing game for everyone - the rights holders need to understand that this is largely a question of *pricing*. If a DLed album was a quid, everyone would be happy to pay it. Most would... Enough would! At a tenner, nope - you create a pirate market.

With porn, it's slightly different - there's a reluctance to stick it on your plastic. So the best option there is an escrowed micropayment system - and no reason, other than the prudishness of people like Apple, why the same system couldn't be used to buy and sell all digital products. Yes, sell - if I buy the rights to some music for a while, why can't I sell it on if I get fed up with it? I used to buy and sell vinyl...

If this is right, and the actual damages for downloading are the net loss for the producer - i.e. 15-30 quid, not 500-1000, then by demanding that amount while threatening court action to take even more, I would have though he could be accused of fraud?

I wish our courts here had the sense of those in the UK. Unfortunately the laws are written and enforced for the benefit of big business. There's lots of ways to fix these stupid laws and excessive lawsuits, but the legal system is broken and not listening.

As far as intellectual property is concerned, is there actually a problem? The last figures I saw showed record profits and growth in many creative industries in spite of record piracy and the growing FOSS movement. Where is the destruction of the creative industries that we are so frequently warned of? The whole "anti-piracy" campaign appears more and more like an anti-Internet campaign as it progresses.

i am 63 yrs old, chronicaly disabled, dependant on oxygen 24/7, and i recently recieved a letter from acs-law demanding a settlement of £1200 for a porn download which i have no knowledge of. I was shocked when i first recieved it, then that turned to anger. After doing a bit of research i realised i was not alone.There is plenty of stuff out there to look at and seek advice from. So do not pay this company any money untill you have covered all options.

There is zero chance of them taking you to court.

ACS Law don't exist to pursue these cases and I doubt they are doing any due dilligence. Most trackers insert random IPs so you could easily just be unlucky. They are working on the basis of 1% of people paying being enough.

No win no fee relies on law firms insuring against defeat and the probable payout in these cases is significantly less than they are asking for so there's no way they would get insurance. You would only get a significant fine if you operated on an industrial scale and frankly for that you would probably be offering direct downloads through a website.

You have a probable case for defamation but its probably going to be easier just to let it go away, which it will.

EDIT: Forgot to say. Excellent article. Kudos for wading through a ton of shit to make some sense of it.

Yes, This happened in the UK, Yes they were stupid and left the information in a internet facing server, yes they were using loopholes in the law to send blackmailing letters. Yes they said they have no proof. yes they say that they cannot prove "Quantum of Damages", (that is that an infringer has made available many times more copies than 1). yes the guy will get hammered in the UK

Nice article, adds a lot of detail to some of the things that've been published in some of the online IT rags I occasionally read.

The problem is the "extortion" model is spreading. Did you know this is the exact same process that the UK government uses to prosecute speeders caught by speed cameras? How long before this moves elsewhere? So much for innocent until proven guilty. While the House of Lords is right to make a fuss about all this, the problem is they're completely toothless unless Parliament actually does something.

The UK also has the European Court of Human Rights legislation to deal with ... or more accurately it doesn't. There's a wonderful clause known as Article 6.1 which is similar to pleading the 5th Amendment. Too bad there's UK legal precedent to ignore this completely. See the case of Idris Richard Francis vs. the D.P.P. at http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Admin/2004/591.html .

Given the extensive coverage of the USCG's activities, both in this particular article and on ars in general, i'm going to go with yes, the Americans, both writers and readers, are perfectly aware of it.

Given the extensive coverage of the USCG's activities, both in this particular article and on ars in general, i'm going to go with yes, the Americans, both writers and readers, are perfectly aware of it.

Good, now perhaps the members of Congress and the judges should also be aware. There may then be hope for the thousands of (Innocent until proven guilty) people caught up in the USCG scam.

After keeping quite the entire week while the entire ACS LAW fiasco was slowly unveiling to the entire world, I am happy that ARS finally gave it the attention that it needed. What's truly painful is the fact that the questionable bullying methods used by ACS to extract 'fast cash' from the 'accused' coincided with the worst financial recession which hit UK and other parts of the world which only helped in adding salt to wounds.

I have been following the daily reports from Torrentfreak all this while ( those guys are doing a very great ..rather patient job of going through the emails and trying to make out a meaning of their operations ! ) and what I could make out from all this is that for ACS its just a ATM machine scheme..send frightening letter to hundreds..if not thousands of people wrapped in professional sounding words of legal mumbo jumbo and wait for a substantial number of the 'accused' to pay up the sum without contesting ..in fear of legal proceedings. Sum varying anywhere between GBP500 to GBP 1500. No wonder Crossley was looking at Ferrari and a nice Property in a short time after starting his operations.

Since the lobbying of the RIAA and MAFIAA has now helped change 'laws' in several countries to make any lawsuit in the name of copyright infringement a 'valid' and 'legal proceeding', no wonder firms like ACS LAW has only joined the bandwagon to make some fast cash at the expense of mostly non techie internet users. As evident from hundreds of emails..most of the accused are moms,grandmoms and granddads..accused of downloading gay, granny, tranny et al forms of porno materials in their computer, thereby causing massive loss to the industry.Their way of salvation is forking out 500-1000+ sterlings and settle the matter.This would save them from further embarrassment and massive financial damages. There is nothing here about fighting to protect the rights of the artists or copyright holders...just plain and simple extortion scheme...which has surprisingly proved to be lucrative without much hassle.

Its a pity that we are now living in a time where such business is 'legal' in the eyes of law and firms like ACS is allowed to continue its atrocities. I just hope that the revelations into their business practice does more than causing a few days of headache of a non working ‘homepage’. The website will be back soon and ACS will continue with its antics. I just hope that the politicians take notice...use these emails as proof and make it illegal for entities like ACS to operate business on similar grounds. I just hope that this matter is now debated in the parliament and law firms like ACS is barred from practicing such blackmails and extortion. Until then general masses will be able to do sh** to challenge them on court.

Ahh, a member of the "crimes committed in a car aren't really crimes because, well, it's my car isn't it, I can do what I like behind the wheel of my car" brigade...

algebraist wrote:

The problem is the "extortion" model is spreading. Did you know this is the exact same process that the UK government uses to prosecute speeders caught by speed cameras? How long before this moves elsewhere? So much for innocent until proven guilty. While the House of Lords is right to make a fuss about all this, the problem is they're completely toothless unless Parliament actually does something.

This is, of course, complete nonsense.

The process the government uses to prosecute offenders caught by speed cameras is different because:

1. The speed cameras provide concrete proof that an offence has been committed, viz. a photograph of your car. Speeding. (Well, actually, two photographs taken a fixed period of time apart, timestamped, so that the speed of the car can also be calculated by the distance the car has travelled between the two photographs, if you dispute the accuracy of the radar measurement. This is why anywhere there are speed cameras, there are also distance markings on the road.)

2. The government do prosecute you if you ignore the fixed penalty notice, and you have an opportunity to defend yourself if you wish.

The reason people just pay the fine (and then whine about it) rather than going to court is because they have actually committed an offence, and proof exists, and they know they would lose in court. This is rather different to ACS Law's blackmail.

What is interesting is that the UK ISPs are using ACS:Law and their blackmailing tactics as part of their business model. O2 and I dare say Sky (who customers details have been leaked) are making money from selling customers account details and history to ACS and then "hiding" behind the legal speak "We only handed over data after being presented with a court order".

TalkTalk and Virgin both challenge the "court orders" to provide a solid legal argument as to why they should divulge confidential details about their customers, as such ACS no longer request this information from TalkTalk and Virgin as it's not worth the hassle.

Bottom line is: If you hear about customers on your ISP getting sent threats from ACS, change ISP as they appear to be working together to blackmail people.

Why doesn't anyone in USA ask what is happening to data collected by these firms who have links to ACS Law, Do you really think the USCG is any more professional than ACS Law. they use the same Flawed methods of data capture, and are utilising the same business model - ie go to court to get the judge (who only hears one side of the story as the ISP's cannot be bothered to contest) to issue demands to the ISP to release the names and addresses, then send letters stating that "they dont want to take you to court but we will if necessary, you can make this all go away if you pay us $1500", No one is ever taken to court as it is too costly.

That article was hard as hell to read. It seemed like it was created directly from a bullet point list without enough time to polish.

And the lengths gone through diving into the guy's privacy to drudge up stuff seems distasteful in my opinion.

Article could have been one third the length and gotten the point across without making it seem like the writer was a vengeful catty stalker.

I think the anti-piracy lawsuit process is of extreme interest to many Ars readers. I, at least, am suspect regarding the work these firms do to verify their own information. To me, they come off as profit mills!

This provides quite a bit more information. I think the next step would be to see whether more legitimate-seeming companies are much better.

And the lengths gone through diving into the guy's privacy to drudge up stuff seems distasteful in my opinion.

It simply shows something important - these people do not give a flying hoot about the artists' hard work at all; as long as they can make a quick smash and grab themselves.

The "won't somebody think of the musicians and actors!" has as much integrity behind it as "won't somebody think of the children!". Want to get that money back, mr. singer-songwriter? Sorry, no can do; it was used to fund the legal dept.'s new Bentley.

The sad thing is, I think that this sort of practice will need to become much more widespread before it is stamped out. You will need to have many, many more people complaining of being falsely accused of infringement and being threatened with legal action and then reporting this to their political representatives before legislation is introduced to make this type of practice what it should already be: illegal.

I wish our courts here had the sense of those in the UK. Unfortunately the laws are written and enforced for the benefit of big business. There's lots of ways to fix these stupid laws and excessive lawsuits, but the legal system is broken and not listening.

It's not written for the benefit of big business. It's to protect the people from big business just taking whatever IP they want and using it for themselves without giving a dime to the inventor or artist. Ironically, big business is doing what it can to protect this right, while the mobs of freetards keep promoting this idea that IP protection is only for big business. It's only big businesses who can afford to protect their IP. Small fish, like myself, can't afford the lawyers and firms required to go after the folks who pirate my work.

There was a story awhile ago about how pharmaceuticals in India are fighting IP tooth and nail, because it's much easier and cheaper to reverse engineer the drugs than it is to do the primary research. Coincidentally, it's countries like the US that are coming out with the primary research for the very reason that it protects IP for a period of time. So, the freetard nation would have it such that primary research would not come with the IP protection and they keep saying that primary work would accelerate due to the relaxation of IP controls. If this was the case, then primary research would be coming from countries like India and China rather than from Canada, USA, et. al. Whatever IP we talk about, the result of not protecting it is the same: a great loss in creative research and invention, due to the loss of financial reward. No one of reasonable intellect could possibly want this. America's greatness is founded on IP.

I'm glad that these guys are doing these types of lawsuits. I think what would be a lot better is if there was a government IP enforcement agency which did this rather than the private sector. Some folks say that the settlements should be the same as what one gets for shoplifting. However, there's a record that goes with shoplifting that doesn't come with IP piracy. Maybe if enough of these IP thieves are stung with $500 or $1,000 offers for settlement, they'll stop stealing content. If they're not responsible, but their network is, then they should still be held accountable. Free wifi spots should block P2P networks so that folks can't just surf on some mall wifi to infringe. There are ways to legalize the Internet, and the politicians are dragging their feet so slowly I'm thinking we'll be seeing nature's reinvention of dinosaurs before we see some real action from them.

I wish our courts here had the sense of those in the UK. Unfortunately the laws are written and enforced for the benefit of big business. There's lots of ways to fix these stupid laws and excessive lawsuits, but the legal system is broken and not listening.

It's not written for the benefit of big business. It's to protect the people from big business just taking whatever IP they want and using it for themselves without giving a dime to the inventor or artist. Ironically, big business is doing what it can to protect this right, while the mobs of freetards keep promoting this idea that IP protection is only for big business. It's only big businesses who can afford to protect their IP. Small fish, like myself, can't afford the lawyers and firms required to go after the folks who pirate my work.

There was a story awhile ago about how pharmaceuticals in India are fighting IP tooth and nail, because it's much easier and cheaper to reverse engineer the drugs than it is to do the primary research. Coincidentally, it's countries like the US that are coming out with the primary research for the very reason that it protects IP for a period of time. So, the freetard nation would have it such that primary research would not come with the IP protection and they keep saying that primary work would accelerate due to the relaxation of IP controls. If this was the case, then primary research would be coming from countries like India and China rather than from Canada, USA, et. al. Whatever IP we talk about, the result of not protecting it is the same: a great loss in creative research and invention, due to the loss of financial reward. No one of reasonable intellect could possibly want this. America's greatness is founded on IP.

I'm glad that these guys are doing these types of lawsuits. I think what would be a lot better is if there was a government IP enforcement agency which did this rather than the private sector. Some folks say that the settlements should be the same as what one gets for shoplifting. However, there's a record that goes with shoplifting that doesn't come with IP piracy. Maybe if enough of these IP thieves are stung with $500 or $1,000 offers for settlement, they'll stop stealing content. If they're not responsible, but their network is, then they should still be held accountable. Free wifi spots should block P2P networks so that folks can't just surf on some mall wifi to infringe. There are ways to legalize the Internet, and the politicians are dragging their feet so slowly I'm thinking we'll be seeing nature's reinvention of dinosaurs before we see some real action from them.

I see the Trolls are awake now, You obviously did not read the article, this is not about protecting copyright it is about Thieving lawyers sending blackmail letters with no intention of stopping piracy or proceding to test their so called evidence in court. I am glad that the USA has woken up, and smelled the Coffee, I think you should be thinking "How safe is our DATA when the likes of USCG get hold of it", do you really think they are more professional than ACS Law. When will one of the cases be brought to court individually to test the case.........thats right NEVER, the business model only relys on intimidation and threat.